The Steering wheel for educator professionalisation

Introduction

The TLC’s Continuous Professional Development programme (CPD programme) aims to offer clear pathways, give structure and personalize educator growth, to enable educators to play their strong role in bring into life the WUR Vision for Education (2025).

The Steering wheel for educator professionalisation, is a tool for the organisation to recognize, support, and stimulate educator growth aligned with both organizational needs and individual talents, ambitions, and career pathways.

The Steering wheel for educator professionalisation

The wheel includes both the tasks of an educator and dimensions (levels) of growth:

1. Tasks of an educator: What an educator does in their daily work. Development here should raise educational quality, strengthen teaching culture across the organization, and support each educator's growth toward their teaching identity.
   (See figure 2 for a description of the tasks)
2. Dimensions (levels) of growth: Proficiency levels within each task, allowing educators to see where they currently stand and what's needed to progress. These levels also connect to recognition and rewards within career pathways.
   (See figure 3 for a description of the dimensions)  

Figure 1 The Steering wheel for educator professionalisation. Adapted from the UNIversity Teaching Experience (UNITE) Framework (Van Dijk et al. (2020))

This combination of tasks and dimensions reflects the diversity between educators we see at WUR. Educators can, and should, be at different levels across their tasks to best match their educator identity and the role that they have. For example, an educator can be effective in teaching and supporting learning while being an institutional leader in assessment and innovation. A programme director who is an institutional leader in educational management can also be skilled and collegial in supervision of students.

Figure 2: Explanation of the tasks of an Educator (Adapted from Van Dijk et al. (2020))

Figure 3: Dimensions of Educator Growth (Adapted from Career Framework for University Teaching Graham, (2018; 2024))

How is the steering wheel used? 

The steering wheel represents the ability to set direction, make choices, and ensure that CPD remains aligned with both WUR’s strategic ambitions and educator needs. A steering wheel only has value when someone takes hold of it and decides where to go. The current ask to MT-ESA (October 2026)  is who is driving and who is responsible for making decisions, allocating resources, and ensuring momentum?